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between her knees and shuffled to one side, smiling at me as I squeezed my way into the seat and sat down.
    â€˜On a long trip?’ I said, pointing to the pack.
    â€˜A month,’ she replied, still smiling. Her white teeth were like piano keys against her beautifully tanned skin. ‘Only two weeks left though, and then I fly out of Bombay. You?’
    â€˜Umm, a few weeks.’ I was still holding the leather sandals that Sanita had bought me for the holiday, and they suddenly felt like ten-tonne weights in my hand. ‘M-maybe longer,’ I stammered, tucking the sandals out of sight.
    The bus driver got into the cab and started the engine, while the bus conductor walked up the aisle shooing off the beggars before closing the doors behind them. They ran alongside the bus banging on the window until we picked up speed and they fell away.
    When we arrived in town, a new set of beggars poured onto the bus and we had to fight our way out of the doors. As I stepped out I felt something touch my leg. A small boy was tugging at the hem of my shorts and pointing to the leather sandals I was carrying.
    â€˜I think he wants your shoes,’ the other traveller said, hoisting her rucksack onto her back. ‘It’s them or money, I’m afraid.’
    â€˜What?’ I glanced down at the ragged boy. ‘Oh, yeah,’ I said, and hesitated for a fraction of a second before handing them over.

CHAPTER THREE
    THIS IS YOUR LIFE
    ONE
    The next morning we checked out of the hotel and boarded a train to Bombay; Zed and Dudley struggling under the weight of their unfeasibly large rucksacks, me skipping happily alongside, almost floating on air without baggage or girlfriends to slow me down. By the time we boarded the train to Delhi on the fourth day, after a brief, uneventful stop in Bombay, we had our sights firmly fixed on new horizons. However, our new horizons were slightly blurred by the quirks of India’s transport system. Getting to the hill stations of northern India, where the Dalai Lama lived, meant going through Delhi, and then from Delhi to Dharamsala by bus: two days worth of sleepless travel at the outside, three or four if we rested halfway.
    To avoid Bombay’s Monday morning rush-hour madness on the buses we took a taxi to the railway station, making us feel like millionaires. I dreamed of the old days; the Raj, with the spires of Victoria Station above us and our chauffeur-wallah carrying our bags under the huge stone arches.
    Ten minutes later, when we settled into our second-class sleeper with five others, the old days were the last thing on my mind. The man sitting next to me had a perpetual cough, and brought up huge amounts of phlegm, which he projected like glistening, wobbly bullets from the open window. One of the blobs landed on the head of a passing beggar who looked up at us. I happened to be gazing out and caught the brunt of his stare, ‘Not me!’ I mouthed.
    Zed and Dudley were no better off in their choice of seat either. Zed, who had sat down and opened a book to read, had inadvertently joined the ranks of Mensa, the Indian chapter. It was a seat I eventually learned to avoid like the plague whenever boarding trains or long distance buses in India. He had sat next to a man in a suit and tie, which automatically meant he would have to answer hundreds of questions of such intricate detail as to drive anyone crazy.
    A traveller has a choice upon entering a train compartment, a choice that needs to be weighed up very carefully before sitting down to a twenty-hour journey. Pick your poison with caution because it could be a very slow death. The choices fall into three main groups, all of which have their good and bad sides: Smelly Labourer, Couple with Kid, or Man in Suit.
    The Smelly Labourer is, as I’ve already explained, a spit merchant but other than that he leaves you in peace. Oh yes, another bonus with him is that beggars tend not to bother his end of the